


Birds and Bees and Verities

by hellkitty



Category: Transformers (IDW Generation One)
Genre: F/M, Xeno
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-04-07
Updated: 2011-04-07
Packaged: 2017-10-17 17:51:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,909
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/179583
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hellkitty/pseuds/hellkitty





	1. Chapter 1

Perceptor twitched out of recharge, his sensor span indicating a sudden warmth on his right side. He cycled it through a half dozen improbable alarm codes. Not hot enough to be critical damage of any sort, no fire, no chemical reagent. His optics onlined slowly, for visual feed.

Verity. The diminutive xenomorph had settled against his side, face buried against his red armor, one bare leg thrown over his waist, wedged between his arm and chassis. She seemed…deep in her own kind of recharge.

“Verity,” Perceptor murmured.

She mumbled something, the sound vibrating against his chassis, one small hand curling over the edge of one of his armor plates.

Perceptor pushed up one shoulder. “Verity, are you…unwell?” He couldn’t imagine any other reason why she’d be here. Perhaps she was ill and had come to him thinking he was Ratchet?

“Mmrmph.” Verity’s face lifted from where she’d pressed it against his side. “Me? Nah, I’m fine.” She flopped over, wriggling her back…struts(?) against his side.

Perceptor blinked. “Then…why?” He immobilized his right arm, for fear of shifting and pinching her in the slide of his armor.

Verity pushed up onto one of her hands, her brown eyes blinking wearily. “Trying to sleep here.”

“I..uh…?”

Verity flopped back down, grabbing Perceptor’s hand and twining around it with her legs. “Sleep,” she muttered.

Perceptor frowned but, well, she wasn’t ill and wasn’t doing any harm…he’d ask her again in the morning. He lay back down, stiffly, acutely aware as his systems slipped to recharge, of the alien warmth against his dermal plating. It had been a…long time since anyone had touched him voluntarily.

[***]

Ironfist’s optics were a heavy weight on Perceptor as he took his ration. Perceptor ignored it as best he could—he’d gotten used to some judgmental glares since he had done his upgrades, but this, somehow, was different.

“There a problem?”

Ironfist straightened. “Problem? No. No! I, uh…just…was, well…curious.”

Perceptor tilted his head. “Curious.”

Ironfist studied his cube for a long moment. “I, uh, saw Verity leaving your quarters this morning.”

Oh. Perceptor frowned, unsure how to answer. Unsure, he realized after a moment, what the question he’d be answering was. “Yes,” he said, quietly. The truth. She had left his quarters, after explaining, in her usual, telegraphic style, that she’d had some…bad memory purges. And for some reason, they did not affect her when she was curled up with him. It hadn’t explained why she’d chosen him, but… Possibly, he thought, some effect of the electromagnetic impulses of his field. It bore research.

If he’d ever have time for such benign projects again.

Ironfist stared at him for a long moment, before nodding. The nod perplexed Perceptor—as if Ironfist had figured something out. While Perceptor…hadn’t. “None of my business,” Ironfist said, blue optics dropping to his cube.

“You might ask Verity,” Perceptor suggested, the words an effort, but a shield, keeping distance between him and what he did not know.

Ironfist looked shocked, stammering some excuse, his optics irising wide, almost, Perceptor thought, with alarm.

“Ask me what?” Verity’s voice rang behind Perceptor.

Perceptor waited, while Ironfist staggered awkwardly through a series of ‘erm,’ and ‘well, I…,’ and other hesitations. “Last night,” he said, finally, turning his head, when he decided Ironfist and coherent utterance were not going to happen.

“Oh that?” Verity hopped up onto the bench. “What? Girl can’t snuggle with a hot mech every now and again?”

“I…my core temperature readings are within normal tolerances,” Perceptor muttered, lamely, suddenly sharing in Ironfist’s acute discomfort, aware that he’d spilled too many words, wanting to snatch them back out of the air.

Verity laughed, the sound ringing high and clear through the small shipboard refectory. Springer and Pyro shot strange looks at them. She punched Perceptor’s shoulder. “You’re cute!”

It was Perceptor’s turn to make a strange, slightly choking sound, while Ironfist seemed to just…simmer in some discontent.

“So, what’s up today, guys?” Verity snapped open the white plastic pouch of food, taking an implement she called a spoon and shoveling the contents in her mouth, apparently oblivious to their discomfort. “Oh,” she said, around a mouthful of food, “When you get a chance, Percy, baby, you might want to have a talk—ya know, as much as you do—with the fabber. ‘Cause I gotta say? Pizza-flavored oatmeal?” She made a face. “Nicht sehr gut.”

Percy…baby?

“I’ll…look at it?” What was he even saying?

Verity beamed, tossing the glossy black mop of hair from her face. “You are an absolute doll!” She wriggled on the bench, nuzzling her face against his upper arm. Perceptor stiffened, confused.

“I-I could take a look at it?” Ironfist cut in. “I’m pretty good with fixing things.”

“You? Oh right! Research boy!” Verity beamed. She leaned forward, swallowing another mouthful of breakfast. “Hey, you any good at weapons mods?”

“I…uh,” Ironfist rubbed a rueful hand over his dented blue helm. “Yes. You might say that.” He seemed to melt in the blaze of the sudden smile that broke over Verity’s face.

“Verity,” Perceptor warned.

“What? No harm in having him check out the power suit, is there? Two brains are better than one and all?”

“I’d be glad to!” Ironfist blurted. He seemed…strangely eager. No, Perceptor thought, probably just feeling proprietary of the suit. And the engineering was sound. He should have no problem letting Ironfist look over his work. After all, it had kept Verity alive more than once.

“It would be something I can do,” Ironfist said, quietly. “I’m…not much of a soldier, I think.”

Perceptor frowned. Verity twisted, sitting on the table in front of him. “Hey, come on! Two geeks, geeking out together? Could be fun!”

Fun…? Perceptor didn’t…do fun.

[***]

“This is really interesting!” Ironfist’s large blue optics were wide and sincere, looking up from the opened chassis of Verity’s body armor. “This is mostly your work?”

Perceptor grunted, frowning at a bent plate in the elbow joint. How many times had he told her to report mobility issues to him? And it wasn’t like he said all that much to her, so he rather imagined it would stand out in her memory.

“The life support is unique—well, I’ve never seen it before.” Ironfist was nearly bouncing. Happy. Perceptor remembered when science made him happy. It seemed a very long time ago.

“Modified from her indigenous species.” Well…heavily modified from the NASA suit he’d seen. But it had given him the requirements and the chemical mix for her ‘air’. He’d simply compressed those elements to a solid wafer, using a modified nebulizer to disperse them as needed.

Ironfist had moved on to one of the gauntlets, holding it up to the light. “Huh. You lose a lot of power because of the weight of the armor.” He looked at Perceptor. “We can trim the weight and make her faster.”

Perceptor’s mouth flattened. “No.”

“But—“

“But,” Perceptor repeated, then braced himself for a torrent of words. “Verity is not like us. You get a hand shot off,” he made a gesture to Stores. “We get you another. She loses one, it’s gone.” His optics grew hard, drilling into Ironfist, to make sure he got the point, his targeting reticle lighting up as though lining up a shot.

Ironfist nodded, cowed. “I…sorry. I didn’t think.”

Perceptor softened. It wasn’t Ironfist’s fault, really. And he was trying to learn: Perceptor could see the keen way Ironfist was studying the engineering of the suit that he was appreciating, now, the balance between protection and mobility. It wasn’t perfect, not by a long shot. But it was the best Perceptor could do. As always…not good enough. He bent back to the other gauntlet, reaching for a multimeter to check the speed of the sensor relays.

“What’s this?” Ironfist tapped a probe at a flattish node.

Perceptor frowned. Trust Ironfist to find that. Well, he was thorough at least. “Targeting alarm,” he said, keeping his voice flat and neutral.

“Huh, okay.” Ironfist bent over it, examining it. “Why’s it need a RF transmitter?”

Perceptor shuttered his optics briefly. “Verity…needs to be protected.”

Ironfist picked up a tool, aiming at the node. Perceptor’s hand twitched. “So when a target locks on to her, it pings you?” Ironfist asked.

“She needs to be protected,” Perceptor repeated, hating at the same time as admiring how quickly Ironfist had figured it out. Verity didn’t always pay attention, nor did she have his reflexes. Or firepower. Ironfist looked confused. Perceptor frowned. “Balance of strength and liability. Point of being on a team.” That’s what he told himself, anyway.

“Oh,” Ironfist said, unconvinced.

[***]

Perceptor jerked awake. No. He’d locked the door this time. But…there she was, face on his black pelvic span, body draped along one thigh, hands....

“Verity!”

“Gah!” Verity jerked awake, her hands clutching at…Perceptor winced.

“…nnnnngh! Hands!”

“What? Hey it’s cold here and that’s warm in there.” Verity wriggled her fingers around the gap in his thigh armor.

“Verity. Hands.” He tried to sound commanding, while his sensornet spiked. Why didn’t this happen to Springer? Or Kup? No, better not Kup. Not…uncontrolled. “You…could be injured.” That was not the reason at all, but…she didn’t have to know that. “Verity.” He squirmed as she moved her hands again. “Please. Hands.”

“Sheesh,” Verity frowned. “Don’t know why you’re gettin’ all—ohhhhhhhh.”

Perceptor did not like the crafty gleam in her optics. “Verity,” he said, warningly, readying a hand to snatch at her, his ventilation hitching.

“Perceptor,” she said, through a giggle. “Someone…ticklish?”

Not…quite. “Don’t.”

“Awwww, come on! It’s fraggin’ adorable! Big scary frowny Percy? Ticklish?” Verity wriggled upward, straddling his thigh. She wiggled her fingers threateningly. “Now, where else could we try…?”

Perceptor covered the gap in his armor. “The door was locked,” he said, deflecting.

“Psssssh,” Verity shrugged. “That.” She leaned forward, tickling—he guessed that’s what the gesture was called—at his abdominal plating. He flinched back. She laughed, lunging forward, digging in under the coolant hose. Perceptor jolted upright, throwing his head back at the spike of sensation over his net, ventilation catching in sharp gasps. Her hands were…small and could get into some normally unreachable places. She cackled.

“Verity!” he gasped, hands curling into empty fists on the berth, as though clutching after control.

Verity chortled. “I’ll make you beg for mercy!”

“Please,” he choked out, at the ceiling. Something in the tone of his voice got her attention. She froze.

“Uh…that doesn’t tickle?”

He didn’t trust himself with words. He shook his head.

“But…it doesn’t hurt.”

He cycled a ragged vent, shaking his head again.

“Oh.” Something he never thought he’d see: Verity, confused, embarrassed. Her hands fell to her sides, rumpled hair framing a face torn between laughter and embarrassment. “I, uh, could just leave?”

Perceptor shuddered another ventilation, dropping back to his elbows, staring at the ceiling as though begging for composure. His sensornet was ablaze, and the heat and strange velvet softness of Verity’s limbs over his thigh armor was…a bit much. “Just…go back to sleep,” he muttered, falling back, flat, fighting his ventilation, fighting his sensornet, fighting the memories of other hands—larger hands—other touches, hard and sleek. “Back to sleep,” he repeated, as if hoping to quell the disobedient sensations.

It was a miserable night.

[***]

Ironfist saw it now that he was looking for it. No one had complained when he took rear guard, figuring that meant more action for them and…kept him out of the way. But he was learning, he was determined to learn, and this time, he was learning the cool precision of Perceptor’s aim as the taller mech drove forward, ducking behind cover, popping up to fire a precise round at a target. Periodically whirling, lobbing an energy bolt seemingly at random. But Ironfist knew what to watch for now, and could see the near misses on Verity’s red armor from shots disrupted by Perceptor’s almost careless precision.

The enemy opened a barrage. High caliber fire ripped through the air—Ironfist was proud he could recognize it by the sound.

//Perceptor,// Springer said on mission comm net, //We’re pinned till you get him.//

//On it.// Ironfist, behind the hulk of a burned out vehicle, saw Perceptor cock his head, getting an audio triangulation of the source of the fire, then drop to his back, worming along the ground, heels and shoulders, to change position.

Ironfist ducked as a spray of bullets thunked into the vehicle he was hiding behind. He felt a small burst of pride. See? Cover, not just concealment.

But Verity…? Oh no. She was bouncing behind a small outcrop of stone, preparing to dash for something. No!

Ironfist couldn’t do much, but he could do that. He bolted forward as Verity moved, throwing himself to the ground in front of her just as the gun swept back around, homing in on the target. Rounds thudded into his backplate four hot red punches against his sensornet, just as Verity’s powersuit slammed into his chassis.

And then the heat and roar of an explosion behind him, as Perceptor had reared up and taken his shot, hitting the gun in its magazine, igniting the rounds.

Cheers went up over the commnet, just before Springer’s voice had tiredly called for an evac for Ironfist. Perceptor was a hero and Ironfist, even as he curled himself around Verity, knowing with 100% probability that he had saved her, felt like a loser.

[***]

Perceptor tried to ignore Verity’s surprised look, and the rush of murmurs as he beckoned her from the edge of the rec room. “Come with me,” he said, turning and heading down the corridor to his quarters, without looking to see if she was following, his face rigid, trying not to ask himself why he was doing…what he was about to do.

Verity trailed into his room, looking for once a little embarrassed. “Hey, uh, I know you’re gonna chew my aft off about Ironfist and stuff. Springer’s already laid into me. And Kup. And…pretty much everyone else.” She shrugged. “Guess I deserve it.”

Well. “It could have been you instead of he that got hit,” Perceptor said. “And in the end, he can be repaired.” Ironfist was mostly already repaired, actually. Just spending the night in the medbay to be sure, because of his…other infirmity. “Not why I called you here.” Well, it sort of was. Faintly related.

“Okay, sure! I hacked your lock!” Verity pouted. “But if you really wanted to keep me out, you of all mechs? Yeah, you could find a better way than a 16 digit random code.”

True. But…irrelevant. “Also not why.” He seemed exhausted by words. And really, really having second thoughts about this. He blinked, tiredly, and headed over to the berth, sitting down. How to explain this? “The other day. The, uh…the ‘tickling’.”

“That didn’t tickle.”

He nodded, cycled a vent of air. “Verity. Mechs are primarily electrical systems.” He decided that the wall on the far side of the room was suddenly grippingly fascinating to look at. “We have innate piezoelectric charge. Additionally, tactile friction raises charge and can lead to a…semi-spontaneous cascade of capacitor influx and—“

“You get off on it.” Verity’s arms were folded over her chest.

“…yes.” In so many words, yes. Why was this so hard?

“And…?” Her brown eyes glinted, and Perceptor got the very real sensation that she was somehow enjoying his discomfort. Well, perhaps she could, because he, certainly, was not. He wondered if it was too late to shift to yelling at her about Ironfist.

“And,” AND that wall was really fascinating again, he decided. “There are, uh, ways to go about it that are, ahem,…more effective than others.”

“And?” He could hear something almost like laughter in her goad.

“And…perhaps you should know them.” He fought a sudden urge to bolt out of the room. And settled instead for staring at his feet.

“Wait, what? You offering to teach me the ways of Robot Perv?”

Perceptor’s hands clenched helplessly. Not into fists, but after some imaginary sense of control. He…hadn’t really planned this stage of the operation all that well, apparently. “Perhaps,” he repeated, lamely, “You should know them.” He cleared his vocalizer, roughly.

“Really.”

He blinked. “Yes…?”

Her face broke into a grin. “So, Percy, baby, how do we get started?”

[***]

It had been…an excessively long time since someone had touched him. And he feared that he overloaded rather faster—and harder—than did him much credit, but Verity’s small hands, almost impossibly fine and mobile, had traced the seams in his armor, mapped the lines of his power cabling, dipping in under the armor to flirt over the gyros and actuators, to the point where…he’d had no choice. And it was…unseemly, most likely, the way he lay, now, shuddering and limp on the berth.

Verity flopped to the berth beside him, in between his arm and chassis, leaning her shoulders against his side. “That,” she said, “was insanely hot.” She prodded at his elbow with one bare foot, eliciting a wrung-out whimper.

Perceptor flopped his other hand over his face. He hadn’t planned for this, either. He’d meant for…a short demonstration, a few of the major sensitivity lines, but things had gotten out of hand. Things being…his starved sensor net, really.

“I give me an A+,” Verity nodded smugly to herself. She turned. “So, this how I thank you for all the times you’ve saved my ass?”

He shook his head. “Was supposed to be…Ironfist.”

Verity stroked his teal forearm with her foot, idly. “Ironfist? The new guy?”

“He…,” Perceptor’s overload-surging cortex failed at words. Not that he’d done much better earlier. “…is interested in you.” The pieces were easy enough to put together.

“And you’re not?” Verity sat up, folding her legs under her body, her hands gripping into her thighs. Oh frag. This was…exactly not what he wanted.

“Verity, I…?” He looked away, but this time the blank wall was not helpful. At all. “I’m too damaged. You need someone…,” he struggled again. “…less damaged.” He thought of Drift, and their strange, violent, completely symbiotic relationship. Drift, who had left the Wreckers, left him. Possibly, finally, too damaged even for Drift. He ached.

Verity rose to her knees, punching at his rib strut. It didn’t hurt, beyond the emotion on her face. “Know what, Perceptor? YOU don’t get to decide that. You don’t get to pick who I like and who I don’t like. Don’t think I don’t know you’ve saved my ass about 187 million times already. And don’t think I don’t know why.”

“Team,” he said, feebly.

“Team, my ass.” That…made no sense. “Listen, Perceptor. You saved me. You think that doesn’t…do something? Make a bond? You telling me I can’t feel that?” His mouth opened, wordless, thinking of Drift, of bleeding out on the floor of the Decepticon ship. And then….

Verity’s face moved, white with rage. “You know what? Fuck you, then. Seriously. You think you’re in control of everything, huh? Think ‘cause you built me a suit, you get to control how I feel? FUCK YOU.” She kicked off the berth, vaulting his forearm, her bare feet slapping against the floor.

“Verity, where…?”

She jumped up to slap the door controls, her black hair whipping over her shoulders as she turned her head. “Where? To Ironfist, right? That’s what you want?”

And she was gone.

Yes…he thought. That’s what I want.

…Isn’t it?


	2. But if the Heart Lies

It was quiet. Even by Perceptor’s standards, it bordered on the cliché ‘too quiet’. He checked his chrono. He’d had enough recharge. Enough to function, if he set his power protocols to enable his alternator. And there were things to do…things to look after. Springer in the CR chamber, Ironfist in the repair bay, heavily sedated so that the Aequitas protocols did not, well, instantly kill him.

Mercy, wasn’t it? Perceptor found he envied the peace, even the false chemical peace that Ironfist had. It was more than he had.

He pushed off his berth, ignoring the twinges of pain, overriding the warning sensors from his damaged systems. He’d thrown himself in Overlord’s path more than once, to the point where he suspected the rogue Phase Sixer had divined his intent. Take me, instead of the others. Maybe, he thought, a hiss of pain slicing through the thick silence like a scalpel, maybe he’d hoped to be spared…this. Of all the Wreckers, he was the only one who’d known why the mission had really been approved. It wasn’t to free hostages—and good thing, because if that were their objective, they had failed so abjectly as to be court-martialed. It hadn’t been to take down Overlord—he’d been…irrelevant for so long he was off most Alpha Mission Profiles. It had been Aequitas. It has always been Aequitas.

And once again, Perceptor had been Prowl’s obedient lapdog. Just like with Kup, just like before, except this time, he was the mouthpiece, he was the puppet Prowl was controlling.

“I’m not telling you to lie to them,” Prowl had countered, when Perceptor had stood up—or tried to—on principle. “Simply to…ration the truth.” And he’d sat back, tapping meaningfully on the box of cy-gars Perceptor had come to pick up. Rationing. Yes.

Perceptor had had no choice. Or rather he had, but inertia had taken over, and he’d lacked—again, still, as always—the strength to resist. Still too weak. Still not enough.

But no. He’d traded in his science and such moral qualms along with it. He’d held illusions before about what he did and its effect, but...he could no longer. It was not his place. He was merely a tool. A weapon. He had no right to such things as principles. Ideals. Drift had seen. Drift had left. He’d had no right, even then, to say anything, already bound by his own hypocrisy.

He had a right to suffer, though. So he pushed toward the door, ignoring the intermittent flashes of pain from his damaged joints, heading down the hall to the medbay. He would check on Springer, check on Ironfist. Reports to write, file, and then the long, long-delayed comm to Prowl.

He didn’t know why he was hesitating, beyond that he didn’t even want the cool congratulations Prowl would offer up for having achieved...this. The end of the Wreckers. The destruction of the team that had accepted him, even back then, that embraced the outcaste and the unafraid to die. It tasted like betrayal.

But this is what war does. This is how war works.

The corridor was lethally silent. His home--the only place that had begun to feel like home--gutted, empty, and he was the only waking thing here: husks of Twin Twist and the others in the hold-bay, Ironfist and Springer under protocols so deep they might as well be dead. And home. Empty and hollow and dead. The medbay by contrast seemed almost thick with noise—the hum of the cryostasis generator, the cycling clicks of the autoventilator controlling Ironfist’s temperature maintenance subroutines, the soft push of fluids through dozens of tubes.A noise of the undead.

And.

Verity.

He’d…forgotten about her. How?

How…was that she hadn’t needed his help. Hadn’t wanted it, had sat in a sullen, burning silence all the way up to the ship and…disappeared.

Some leader you are, Perceptor. Lose sight of the only other survivor. When no one’s targeting her, she…disappears. Think on that, Perceptor. It means something. It may be the only last, twisted value you have left, and you should contemplate its ugliness, see what you have become.

But now….

“Verity.” Verity lay alongside Ironfist, her back against his orange chassis, one hand hooked over his upper arm, her face nuzzled in the join of his arm and his body. When she didn’t move, he risked a touch, a gentle prod with one finger at her shoulder. “You shouldn’t be here, Verity.”

The eyelids—thin tissue of human dermal plating that seemed impossibly delicate to him—flickered open, her eyes dark pools. So different from the comforting glow of Autobot optics.

Of which his was the only functioning pair in the Wreckers right now. Sobering thought, that he and she were the last ones standing. They were...the Wreckers now. For what that meant. A legacy neither seemed capable of filling.

“You shouldn’t be here,” he repeated, and realized as the drowsy blink disappeared, replaced by a harder face, thinned lips, that he’d—again—said something wrong.

“Don’t tell me where I can or can’t be.” She pushed up to sitting, her long legs between them like a barrier. “Have a right to be here.”

“…it’s not about rights, Verity.”

“Then what is it, huh?”

“Safety,” he said, quickly. “Ironfist is sedated but not immobilized. In his recharge, he might—“

“Can it,” Verity said. “Slept with you twice. Didn’t seem a big deal to you then.” She tossed her head. “And after what we’ve slaggin’ been through you want to go off about ‘safety’?”

Yes. It made perfect sense. Protect what’s left. “I…that was different.”

“Oh, right.” Verity wrinkled her nose, in something like contempt.

It was different, he thought. We weren’t surrounded by death. We weren’t both scraped raw, both physically and….

“The atmosphere,” he said, quietly. “It isn’t good for you.”

“Garrus. Nine.” Verity folded her arms over her chest, thumping back against Ironfist’s numb, sedated side.

Perceptor faltered. “You…have your own quarters.”

“So do you.” Her face was hard, and even after a lifetime of looking at steel-span faces, hers seemed…unnerving.

“Came here to check on them.”

She rocked forward, dropping her knees down, gesturing widely with her arms. “Checked! See? Ironfist, still in the beep-boop. Springer, still ain’t got a face. Nothin’s changed. They’re both…the fraggin’ same.”

And it struck him, finally, like a crack of rifle fire. He hadn’t considered, really, how she was. He’d come to check on them, not her. Because they were physically damaged and that much...he could handle. It was a sharp lash of guilt, under which he flinched. He dropped down to one knee, his right knee, almost automatically, from so many times dropping into a sniper’s position. “Verity,” he said, quietly. “I’m sorry.”

“Sorry don’t fraggin’ solve much.”

He bowed his head. Only too true. And only this…again. “Yes. Got distracted.”

She snorted. “Distracted. Right.”

He picked his words, he hoped, carefully. “Have…too much on my mind.” Even that admission, that he couldn’t handle it, that he was struggling to cope, felt like a broad exposed wound. “I’m here now.” An excuse buried in a limping offer.

“Yeah, guess you finally have time for me, great.” Her face moved into something like a sneer, but somehow sadder.

That was…unfair. No, it was fair. “You didn’t…. Wanted to stay out of your way.” Out of where I’d have to confront my betrayal reflected from someone else’s gaze. Verity had been, was, the conscience of the Wreckers. She’d spoken up when no one else had and he had…shut her down. Or tried to. No wonder she’d disappeared.

“Yeah?” Verity snapped. “Kind of hard since we’re the only ones left.”

“No…yes.” Perceptor felt his hands flatten, open, empty, nothing to offer.

Verity looked over her shoulder at Ironfist, quiet, still, his entire systems scrawled on a monitor overhead, as though everything important, everything that mattered, could reduce to algorithms, blips on a screen. No, those screens missed…everything. “He’ll be okay, right?”

It was a test—or it felt like one. Whether she knew it or not. “No. He’s dying. He’s always been dying.” That was why Prowl had wanted him on the mission.

“Yeah, ain’t we all,” Verity shot back, trying to mask the way the news—confirming what she obviously already had felt—struck her.

“No. Not his way. It’s why I--,” he shut up abruptly, mid word.

“Why…why you threw him at me.” A light of illumination. Her mouth moved in a way he couldn't read.

Yes. That. Partly. Though now it seemed massively unfair—he’d wanted her to be happy and Ironfist to have…some enjoyment before he died. He hadn’t thought enough ahead. Hadn’t, probably, expected to have to deal with the fallout. Why he dealt with range weapons. Don’t have to be in the killzone.

Also because she deserved better than what he could give. Case in point: He’d forgotten about her. “I can’t be what you need.”

A flare of anger, but somehow, less hard, less hostile. “Maybe you don’t know what I need. Maybe you don’t fraggin’ know everything.” Her toes clenched over the edge of the berth.

“…what do you need?”

Her face seemed to crack, eyes glistening tears that spilled over her cheeks. “Just…someone. Someone still alive. Someone who, fuck it, who remembers, and can understand.”

“Don’t think anyone can understand,” he said, quietly. He didn’t. The empty silence of the place seemed to yawn around him, as if preparing to swallow him utterly.

“Well then...just to be confused as hell about it along with me,” Verity said.

He nodded, a surrender, giving in. Because in the end, it was all he dared ask for, himself.


	3. Echoes of Loss

It had been three rotational cycles since Ironfist had offlined, and Verity had not, Perceptor had noted, left her quarters once. This seemed...unusual. She was normally everywhere, and in the ringing emptiness of the ship, her silence seemed to echo.

He chimed on her door. No response.

“Verity,” he said to the blank face of the closed door, feeling foolish. A hard, strong silence.

He paused. She might want privacy—he had wanted nothing more when Drift had left him. But even then, even he, had realized there was a limit.

He was the ranking mech of the Wreckers—Springer was still in medbay. He had the override codes for the ship. Three days, he thought. Without fuel. She might...not be operational. She might be injured. Or...she was simply recharging.

In which case, there was surely no harm in looking.

He tapped the override code. The door pushed aside on a cushion of silence. Rank, sour air and darkness like a wall.. He stepped across the threshold. “Verity,” he said, softly, his optics cycling to lowlight.

There. A lump on the floor, next to the berth. He dropped to one knee, measuring respiration, any sort of metric he might use to gauge her status and condition. “Verity,” he repeated.

“Go 'way,” the voice floated up from the ball of limbs.

“Status,” he said. He wouldn't leave until he was reassured of her condition. And by the smell, it wasn't good. “Have you been refueling?”

“Get stuffed.”

He cycled another vent. “Verity.” He prodded her shoulder, gently, with one finger. Her skin felt gritty and dry, and her hair, when she turned her head, was lank and dull. Improper maintenance, he thought. He recognized this all too well: he had sat for cycles after Drift left, staring at microcorrosion in his lines as the only passage of time, welcoming it as if he was literally falling apart from abandonment, collapsing into rust. Wanting it to happen faster, as if he could will himself to rot.

Verity, he remembered, had come for him then. Poking him with his duty, and little tasks that needed fixing, things to do with his hands, with his mind, that didn't require thinking or feeling. Things that got him going again: fix the fabricator, re-enamel part of her power suit, batch up some nutrients. Simple, mindless tasks. He'd resented them at the time, resented having to move, pull himself from the torpor of his own remembrance. But he'd done it, crawling, in a way, step by step from the pit of his grief.

He could do this much for her.

He scooped her up, ignoring her protests, her small bare feet useless as they kicked against him. He carried her over to the small washrack. He hit the taps before dropping her unceremoniously on the tiled floor. “Wash,” he said.

Water rained down on her head, her body, her clothes smudged and wrinkled growing dark and damp, clinging to her skin. She glared balefully up at him from under a matted mop of hair, the skin around her eyes swollen and red, the eyes themselves looking raw.

Perceptor blocked the opening of the washrack with his body. “Wash. Or stay wet.” He stared her down, face implacable.

Verity swore, shucking her clothes. She flung her sopping shirt at Perceptor, warm water lashing up across his face from where it had splatted on his chestplate, resorting to impotent anger. He understood. He pinched it off his armor, dropping it to one side as she began scrubbing some sort of cleanser through her hair, fingers raking with a kind of fury at the dark mats. White foam sluiced down her body, the pale skin of her legs.

Perceptor found himself watching her, studying the way her flesh moved—the even slide of muscle under skin, the more fluid bounce of her breasts. Exotic and alien. So different yet the emotions...the same.

She scrubbed herself clean, scouring her skin with such force that the white flesh turned almost pink, before she slapped off the tap. She flung the scrubbing rag down. “There,” she said, defiantly, water glossing her body, dripping down her face, the flatness of her wet hair, runneling between the swells of her breasts. “Washed.” Her mouth twisted. “Doesn't help a damn thing.”

“I know,” Perceptor said, softly. Something in his voice shook her out of herself, her brown eyes clearing for a moment, as though they could for the first time see something outside herself and the limits of her mourning. He looked away, half in some belated modesty, half to avoid this moment of vulnerability. “Should eat something.”

She swore at him, a flat, unoriginal obscenity, but with more energy than she'd shown before. Progress. Of sorts. She pushed past him, wet feet splatting against the decking.

“Verity,” he said, stepping back.

“Leave me alone.”

“No.”

“Why not?” She stopped, hands on the swells of her hips, turning to glare at him.

“You didn't.” She'd been inexorable, getting Perceptor moving again, doing again. And--eventually--caring again.

“It's not the same!” she snapped. “He's dead!”

“It's worse: He's alive,” Perceptor retorted, his entire chassis aching, “and...gone.” He whipped his head to look away. Drift's leaving had torn something in him. At least Ironfist was dead, involuntary. Drift had packed up, suddenly, hopped a transport for Earth. No explanation. No word. Just...gone.

Silence stretched between them, stunned by the enormity of the wounds between them, threatening to devour them.

Perceptor turned to the door. “I'll leave you alone,” he murmured.

“No. Please? Please don't. Look, we...don't have to talk, or do anything. Just...,” Verity's eyes were glistening, overfull from a different kind of tears. Water dripped from the long tendrils of her black hair, making wet coins on the decking.

Perceptor turned, aching, fuel pump burning as if trying to sear off the emotion, dropping to one knee. “What do you want from me?” A charge and a question, pulling toward and pushing away.

“You,” she said, quietly.

“Nothing left,” Perceptor said, spreading his palms. He was empty, hollowed out of feeling. It was the only way he could function. Verity was the one who was filled with life. Even now, crushed by loss, life coruscated in her, as if a restless sun just under her skin. And he? He was a husk, rolling through routine because he could not allow himself the cowardice of suicide.

“Just...whatever's left. Something real.” Verity's mouth twisted, as if trying on a smile or fighting tears before just pressing together as she reached up, wrapping one arm around his neck to rest her cheek on the edge of his chest plate. He could smell the slightly-sweet scent of her wet hair, feel the warmth radiating from her bare skin. His hands came around her, pulling her against him, the warm softness of her body yielding against his own hardness, her cool flesh warming with contact.

“Yes,” he said, softly, standing up, feeling her other arm twine around his neck, her face buried against his chassis, as he carried her gently over to the berth. She was tired of crying: he could feel the hollow exhaustion as though touching her very bones. He settled down onto the berth, holding her carefully against him.

“Not sleepy,” she said, but the gentle idle of his engines soothed her, pulling her under into sleep, real and almost restful, compared to that haunted parody of sleep that grief gave one.

Perceptor lay listening to her respirations, feeling the press of her skin against his metal, water slowly evaporating off her. He shouldn't be here. He couldn't be what she wanted, what she needed. He would let her down. Eventually.

Drift. He still didn't know what he'd done to drive the white mech away. Only one day, he'd awoken to Drift, packing a small box of belongings, giving Perceptor a gruff nod. “Leaving?” Perceptor had managed, disbelieving what he was seeing.

“Earth,” Drift had said. “They need me.”

Perceptor had choked down the painful, pleading admission, “I need you, too.” Not fair, selfish. The war needed Drift more, deserved Drift more. He had lost him...and he didn't know how.

And now...this. Perceptor shuttered his optics, locking himself into that pain, fighting not to leave, to run away.

 

[***]

When he woke up, Verity was already dressed, her hair pulled into its usual bouncy ponytail. “Morning,” she said. It was a shadow of her usual perkiness, but the effort was palpable. Effort Perceptor didn't deserve.

He pushed up to his elbow, studying her. She looked better...marginally. The skin around her eyes was still red and swollen, but they eyes themselves had lost the tearful gleam. “Verity.” He reached one hand, one finger tracing the contour over her shoulder, down her back, out the flare of her hip. He couldn't give much, but he could give this. He ran another line down, this time along her arm, ending with her hand. He tugged her forward, his other hand wrapping around her waist. He didn't know how to move beyond this, to offer the only thing he could offer. “Verity,” he repeated, his voice vibrating through his armor, against her body as he pressed her against him. “Yes?”

It was as close as he could come. And it felt like tearing himself free from a betrayal, wanting her hands on him. He'd sent her away, sent her to Ironfist before. Did he even have the right?

“It's too soon,” Verity said, “Really. I...can't.”

He withdrew. “I understand.” He hated how much the rejection hurt. He shouldn't feel. He didn't deserve to desire anything. He wasn't worth it.

“No,” Verity said, suddenly. Her mouth quirked into that determined line he'd seen before battle. “Fuck it. Can't mourn forever.” She reached for his hand.

“No,” he said. “You can't. And that...feels wrong, too..”

She nodded. “Part of me wants to, I don't know, get all Civil War widow like forever. But another knows I can't do that.” She looked down at his chest plate. “Like seeing the future, you know? That I'm going to fail. Doomed or something.”

Perceptor nodded. He didn't want to let go of Drift. And in a way, he couldn't. And how could he think it a betrayal when Drift had so clearly, so cleanly turned his back on him? If you were rejected, could you betray? “We don't have to. It's just...all I can offer.”

“Not all you can offer.” Verity's dark brown eyes tilted up into his blue ones. “The fact you bothered to offer anything...,” she murmured, leaning in, her arms around his throat, nuzzling her cheek against his.

“Doesn't have to be me,” he said. “I just...you deserve to be happy, Verity. And I bear some blame in this.” Pushing her to Ironfist, knowing he was dying. He bore more than a little blame—something like guilt lapped around his spark, a sickly fire miscoloring everything it fell upon.

“Not your fault, Perceptor. Not everything that goes wrong is your fault. Or your problem.” A faint flush of a smile over her face, so close to his he could feel the warmth of her body, the pushes of air from her speech. “And I want it to be you.”

He felt his systems fire on, his EM field giving a tremulous flare against her that caught blue sparks in the ends of her glossy hair. And Verity smiled at him, her fingers circling the collar armor. And it was a real smile, honest and daring, if weakly, to be happy. In spite of their losses, their fear of falling apart, they managed to cling together, no promises, nothing more than themselves, wounded and weak, but still, after all of that, reaching out.


End file.
